Week 5 Part 1 - Making Colored Noodles and Rice

This week I decided that I wanted to be ambitious again and try out two different things.  One for the kids, and one for Valentine's gifts.  I started the week with a link that I found to make colored noodles and rice.  On the success of last week's cloud dough, I thought having some multi-colored rice buckets would be fun for the kids.  This pin on pinterest came from The Daily Buzz (http://www.thedailybuzz.com.au/2011/11/make-your-own_homemade_crayons_play-doh_chalk_fingerpaint/).  They had all kinds of great ideas for things to do with the kids.

I stopped by the store to get some rubbing alcohol, rice, and noodles.  My daughter and I found a bag that had three different kinds of noodles (shells, penne, and spirals).  I liked this b/c I can have her sort out the pasta by color then by shape.  It's two for one!  We set off home to dye our pasta. 

I was a little disappointed in myself not thinking to buy more food coloring when I discovered the only colors we had at home were yellow, red, and green.  We made due with what we had and started to mix the rubbing alcohol and food coloring (1 tsp. alcohol to how ever many drops of food coloring you want.)  I did this in a big measuring cup, so I could then just pour the rice or noodles on top of the food coloring mix up to the one cup line and stir.  It was a little harder than I anticipated to get all the mix throughout the rice and noodles and stirring took a little while.  I would let me daughter stir the first couple times, then I would take over to get it evenly distributed. 

 I did not have wax paper as the website suggested to let it dry, so I did foil instead.  We did this on the afternoon, and I let it dry overnight.  Some of the noodles were even a little tacky in the morning, so I let them sit a little longer. 

When my son got out from school, we broke out the rice and split it between two small buckets, so each kid could have their own.  They loved it once again!  I gave them some paper cups, measuring cups and spoons to play with.  They had a blast scoop, filling, and pouring the rice.  My son even put two cups together full of rice, tapped it on the side of the bucket then poured the rice out, saying he was pretending he was cracking an egg.  I loved it!!

The mess factor was bigger in the making of the rice and noodles (My daughter ended up with a stained elbow on her shirt from dipping it in red food coloring).  The mess factor from playing with the rice was minimal.  We kept it at the kitchen table, so it was easy to wipe off.  This was a great activity start to finish, and I like that I can put the rice in a plastic bag and save it for another time too!